F’Altfillifif, UH i’N’t F1 HELEN FRANKENTHALER: PAINTINGS 0N PAPER (1 949-2002)
Poured paintings
Helen Frankenthaler once described the process of beginning a painting as 'making a start somewhere and seeing what happens'. Her method of pouring pigment onto canvas or paper, and dispensing with painterly brushstrokes, gives the work a very spontaneous quality. The colours and their interactions are unexpected. Shapes are formed from freely twisting lines.
A second generation abstract expressionist (after de Kooning, Pollock, Rothko and Krasner), Frankenthaler was only 23 when she pioneered this innovative style of ‘stain-painting’. Inspired by Pollock's technique of placing the canvas on the floor and painting while walking around and through the canvas, she opened up the possibilities of Pollock for the next generation.
“Most of the artists of her generation had been following de Kooning,’ explains Bonnie Clearwater, the exhibition’s organiser and curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art in North Miami. ‘But she realised that with Pollock he really opened up the idea of drawing as .. painting and that line would become form in itself just with the pouring of the paint.‘
Louis Morris and Kenneth Noland were greatly inspired by Frankenthaler’s practice. Onto unsized. unstretched and unprimed canvases, she would allow paint to flow and soak into the fabric to create abstract forms. The shapes evoked imagined or remembered landscapes and the layers of colour created a sense of depth similar to watercolour effect. She would use this technique on paper too, some of the works being up to six or seven feet in size. Although the works may look free flowing and spontaneous, there is much more to them than meets the eye.
‘There is a balance between her delicate marks and where she just lets things happen,’ says Clearwater. ‘The reason she’s able to work that way is that she has really studied the art of the past and understood what makes those works work. Sometimes she will spend weeks or months just trying to get one little line or colour in the exact hue in the exact spot in order the l’ll()l()(‘ift/\l’llY ,v-”" - “
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From the recognisable ’ -- ‘ rrnages of ()rndy Sherriiair to rarely seen works by l iancesca Woodman, After Image explores how worrren are depicted by women through the rnedrum of photography.
lo pick only ten images by Cindy Sherman from a body of around dot) seerrrs an injustice but they do serve as a taster to the many ferrrale stereotypes Sherman has sought to present. In the Untitled film Still series, the grainy. black and white photograph of a woman lying across a bed rrrrrrredrately conjures up 1950:; melodrama -— the lemme fatale. lace handkerchief in hand. In corrrplete contrast rs a Single work from the History Portraits. Sherman's first foray into exploring historical, rather than conteirrporary. vrews of women. Inspired by the Old Masters, rt hangs in the space like a painting in a gallery. The transformation rs drairratrc. hurrrorous even. as heavy make-up, false breasts and sumptuous colours make up the COH‘DOSIIIOH.
Ana Mendreta's Untitled Facial Hair Transplants reference Marcel Ducharrrp's LHOOO when he famously added a beard and moustache to a postcard of the Mona Lisa. With the addition of facral hair borrowed from her male friend. she takes on a maSCirlrne identity. In the intriguing Super 8 film Ocean Bird Wash. she allows her naked, feather-adorned body to be devoured by the ocean's waves. Her motionless body floats in the water like a corpse.
Upstairs are the very hauntingly beautiful works of Francesca Vr/oodrrran, rr‘aue all the more poignant by the knowledge that she corirrrrrtted suicide at the age of 122. The black and white photographs investigate and define what it rriearrs to be ferrrale Reducing her body to an almost insignificant blur. tWrstrng tree roots entwrrre ner. peeling wallpaper envelops her. the works not onh document her artistic development but her own transition from child to adult.
Srmryn (‘irll presents a more contemporary take on these issues. looking ll‘Olt? at cultural identity. All four, however. successfully seek to question, rexeal and investigate in therr own unrgue way, how the female form is represented (Helen Monaghan)
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Throughout her long and influential career, Frankenthaler, now 75. continues to paint using this technique. The forthcoming retrospective at the Royal Scottish Academy brings together for the first time in Scotland, over 40 works spanning her entire career.
‘What’s so fascinating about this exhibition is to see how someone takes a certain vision that's there at the beginning of her career and is able to keep it fresh and alive and that was one of the joys of seeing the show, she says. ‘lt doesn’t look dated at all. it looks extremely fresh.‘
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THE LIST FESTIVAL GUIDE 69